There’s a longer version of this trail that begins on Kenosha Pass and continues on to Georgia. Here we’re going to take highway 285 over the top of Kenosha and turn right at the small berg of Jefferson. Take the first right. It goes to Jefferson Lake. There’s a fee to enter the “recreation area.” Five or six bucks.

Great campgrounds along the Jefferson Lake road if you want to make a weekend of it.

Park at the Colorado Trail trailhead and walk left across Jefferson Creek on the log bridge. Turn right and keep going straight, ignoring the Colorado Trail sign on your left. You’re now on the Jefferson Loop trail. Eventually you’ll pass through a campground. Keep going on an old road, which soon turns to trail and begins a gradual climb through the pines to Georgia Pass. Many streams and numerous flowers. After you admire the view from the top head down on the Colorado Trail, a long and dry passage whose switchbacks eventually dump you on the route back to the car.

The ride home is always better if you fill up on barbecue at Hog Heaven in Pine Junction.

Travel and OutWest editor Kyle Wagner grew up in Pittsburgh and lived in Lake County, Ill., and Naples, Fla., before moving to Denver in 1993, where she reviewed restaurants for Westword before moving to The Denver Post in 2002. She considers the best days to be those that involve her teenage daughters and doing something outside, preferably mountain biking or whitewater rafting.

Dean Krakel is a photo editor (primarily sports) at The Denver Post. A native of Wyoming, he has authored three books, "Season of the Elk," "Downriver" and "Krakel's West." An avid kayaker, rafter, mountain biker, trail runner, telemark skier and backpacker, Dean's outdoor adventures have taken him around the world.

Douglas Brown was raised about 30 miles west of Philadelphia in West Chester, Pennsylvania, where he spent a lot of time running around in the woods and fields (where he hunted and explored), and in the ocean (where he surfed and stared at the horizon). Now he lives in Boulder and spends as much time hiking, running, skiing and boarding the High Country (and the Boulder foothills) as possible.

Ricardo Baca is the entertainment editor and pop music critic at The Denver Post, as well as the founder and executive editor of Reverb and the co-founder of The UMS. Happy days often involve at least one of these: whitewater rafting, snowshoeing, vintage Vespas, writing, camping, live music, road trips, snowboarding or four-wheeling.